For every batch of students we train, we take them for a day trip outside of the city. Instead of Mysore this time, we went on an arranged trek to Savandurga, one of the amazing hills that surround Mysore. The day started off a little bit later than expected, with the first of our buses apparently ending up in an accident resulting in a rather long wait for the second to be dispatched. The result, a group outing breakfast to one of the darshinis (stand up eating places) and a round of masala dosas kicking off the day.

We stopped to pick up our companion guides for the day, one of them including the national rock climbing champion who told us some amazing stories about her early days of training. Apparently the sturdy rock climbing equipment of today wasn’t available in India and the result was either using no equipment or a sturdy rope harness system with an anchor person. We all found her stories pretty amazing.

We picked up our packaged lunch consisting of rice and vadas wrapped in banana leaves and newspapers. We also picked up two litres of water each that ended up being a wise move as the day was completely exhausting for everyone.

Our first stop at the hill was a temple at the base where we anointed ourselves with some coloured powder and picked up two more travelling companions (starting to feel like Dr Who a little bit) in the form of two dogs. Both dogs followed us for the entire trek and really seemed like old hands at the path, with one of them later following us up the mountain as well.

The trek was relatively easy with a well defined path and thin enough brush to push past. A few slippery spots and grassy knolls later found us at a point where our guides set up some equipment for abseiling. Everyone tried it out, even to the small protests of the few and everyone thoroughly enjoyed the experience. We continued to trek to the lake (or rather apparently a dam) built to the other side where we ravenously consumed the packed lunch we’d carried down. The final parts of our trip saw us return to the bus to top up on our low water supplies before heading back to scale the mountain and finish the day off with some rock climbing.

A great and exhausting day that, even though we all ended up a bit sweaty and smelly, slept especially well that night. Check out the photos here.